Making the academy more friendly to women.

We all know the academy can be an unfriendly place for women. But exactly why is it so hard for women to succeed in higher education leadership, and what can we do about it?

Dr. Deborah Rhode, professor of law and director of the Center on Ethics at Stanford University CA, discussed the challenges women face in a keynote address at the American Council on Education Office of Women in Higher Education's Northern California network meeting in San Francisco in March.

'Partial progress'

Rhode began with her story, which demonstrated how far we've come. When she arrived at Stanford 25 years ago, she was only the second woman on a faculty of 36. There were no women's organizations, committees or events on campus--except for the faculty wives' tea, to which she was not invited.

It was the same at Stanford's law school, where women were only 5% of faculty and 2% of tenured faculty. And when someone did raise the "woman issue," the response was not positive. "What is striking to me now is how little of this was striking to me then," she said. "It was just how law and life in the academy were."

Society has changed since then, but academic leadership has made only a partial transformation. Women are the majority of participants at the bottom--60% of undergraduates--yet are severely underrepresented in top leadership--20% of college and university presidents.

It's the same in other elite professions, and in general cultural leadership in America. Although women today now assume powerful and influential positions, we have yet to claim the highest, most visible positions in politics, business management and law. While the United States is not the only country lagging behind, it's not pushing the women's agenda. Rhode pointed out that during her writings, the U.S. ranked 66th in female political representation--behind Sierra Leone.